Full Course Description

Understanding Trauma: Foundations

Program Information

Objectives

  1. Evaluate the impact of trauma on neurological structures and related behavioral disruptions.
  2. Relate classic conceptualizations of trauma to current formulations and research findings.
  3. Select trauma treatment approaches that best match symptom presentation and client characteristics.

Outline

  • New advances in trauma treatment
    • Hidden and interpersonal nature of trauma – socio-cultural context
    • Military perspectives shape trauma research and treatment in the US
    • Primary sources of trauma risk
  • Case demonstration – trauma related impairments
    • Conditional nature of trauma responses
    • Loss of purpose and meaning as result of trauma
  • Characteristics of trauma therapists and survivors
    • Neurobiology of reward systems
  • Taking a trauma history – establishing trusting therapeutic relationship
    • Demographics, physical factors, family and childhood experiences
  • Trauma impacts key structures underlying emotional regulation     
    • Research findings on the impact of child abuse and neglect
    • Ability to be self-aware and self-regulate
    • Childhood antecedents of self-destructive behavior
  • Development and utility of DSM trauma conceptualizations
    • Diagnostic limitations – complying with reimbursement demands
  • Adverse Childhood Experiences study – results and implications for treatment
    • Effects of child maltreatment on health
  • Psychological impact of childhood trauma – alterations in perception
    • Challenges and methods of assessing inner states
    • Balancing of thinking and feeling in perception and decision making
  • Childhood processing of trauma dependent on attachment environment
  • The nature of traumatic memory – sensory modalities
  • Classic conceptualizations of trauma reactions and transition into current formulations

Copyright : 01/12/2023

The Nature of Trauma: Developmental Neurobiology, Neuroimaging Research and Effective Intervention

Program Information

Objectives

  1. Examine the development of treatment interventions in the history of trauma theory.
  2. Evaluate the impact of trauma on neurological structures and subsequent impairments in brain development.
  3. Differentiate current approaches to trauma psychotherapy informed by brain imaging research.
  4. Determine the role of varied brain structures in symptomatic expression of trauma and response to psychotherapeutic interventions.

Outline

  • Effects of trauma on brain organization
    • Attachment and brain development
    • Impact of developing technologies – psychopharmacology
    • Neuroimaging - implementation and limitations
  • Brain structure – sequelae of trauma
    • Limbic system structures affected by trauma
      • Fear response unconscious, not subject to logical resolution
      • Trauma affects deepest areas of brain and basic bodily functions
  • Somatic approaches to healing deep brain function
    • Effects of early trauma on disrupting brain development
    • Development of self-perception and resilience
  • Therapeutic methods for clarifying self-perception
  • Brain structures associated with fear and threat response
    • Therapeutic methods for accessing trauma related disruptions
  • Utility of varied approaches to trauma treatment, psychotheater, synchronization
  • Developmental process of synchronicity and responsiveness in children
    • Case demonstration of separation response in early childhood
  • Impact of trauma on key brain structures underlying emotional regulation            
    • Neuroimaging research findings
    • The nature of traumatic memories – loss of sequence and time sense
    • The nature of therapist response to client experience
    • Case example – central importance of movement in therapeutic intervention
    • Dissociation and alexithymia as persisting responses to trauma
    • Case demonstration – expressions of neurocognitive alterations
  • Predictors of treatment outcome – psychotherapy dos and don’ts
    • Historic antecedents of current therapeutic approaches
    • Necessity of incorporating brain-body connections into trauma therapy

 

Target Audience

Addiction Counselors, Counselors, Marriage and Family Therapists, Nurses, Occupational Therapists, Occupational Therapy Assistants, Psychologists, Social Workers

Copyright : 01/16/2023

Neurobiology of Trauma Treatment: EMDR and New Research Directions

Program Information

Objectives

  1. Evaluate the impact of trauma on neurological structures for self-regulation and interpersonal engagement.
  2. Identify and implement treatment interventions informed by current trauma research findings.
  3. Articulate three areas for future research and the limitations of current evidence based treatments.

Outline

  • Brainstem, attachment & self-regulation
    • Trauma is lived out in the body
    • Infant attachment and differentiation
  • Stress and extraordinary demands associated with child development
  • Parasympathetic nervous system and role of polyvagal nerve
    • Regulation of basic body functions, maintaining stasis
  • Sympathetic nervous system – activation and movement
    • Harmonizing body routines with social surroundings
  • Role of verbal and facial communication in effective engagement with others
    • Utility of varied approaches to trauma treatment, theater, voice and facial training
  • Brain-body integration: assessment and intervention
    • Role of heart rate variability, respiration – impact of trauma
    • Differentiating between distress and PTSD
  • Methods of training heart rate variability – Yoga, religious practice research results
    • Challenges of acceptance into traditional care models
  • Processing traumatic memories
    • Iatrogenic effects of traditional exposure therapies
  • Development of EMDR interventions
    • Assessing client response and level of distress – posture, breathing, muscle tone
    • Case demonstration – MDMA administration and war trauma
    • Challenges to research and acceptance of novel therapies
    • Therapy outcome comparative research findings
  • Mechanism of action for EMDR – neural networks
    • Cortical pathways associated with eye movements
  • Psychedelic agents and trauma processing
    • Case demonstration – terminal cancer and life perspective

 

Target Audience

Addiction Counselors, Counselors, Marriage and Family Therapists, Nurses, Occupational Therapists, Occupational Therapy Assistants, Psychologists, Social Workers

Copyright : 05/02/2023

The Roles Intersectionality & Cultural Humility Play When Working with Diverse Client Populations

Gary Bailey, DHL, MSW, ACSW, discusses Race, Class, and Context in working with trauma.

Program Information

Objectives

  1. Analyze the impact of culture-related trauma on treatment outcomes
  2. Develop a framework for exploring the intersection of trauma, racism, and oppression
  3. Examine the impact of racial oppression as a trauma exposure and cumulative stressor

Outline

Stereotyping Across Intersections of Race and Age

  • Police Shootings & Mental Health of Black Americans
  • The Vicarious Trauma of Racism

Defining Cultural Diversity

  • Cultural Competency
  • Cultural Humility
  • Cultural Dignity

Intersectionality Theory

Cultural Humility

  • Self-Evaluation & Critique
  • Fixing Power Imbalances
  • Partner with Advocates

Microaggressions & Micro-inequities

  • White Fragility
  • Equality vs. Equity

Counteracting Micro-Inequities with Micro-Affirmations

  • Reversing Effect
  • Blocking Effect
  • Witness Effect

Power & Empowerment

  • Advocacy
  • Strategic Discussion

Target Audience

  • Counselors
  • Social Workers
  • Psychologists
  • Psychotherapists
  • Therapists
  • Marriage and Family Therapists
  • Psychiatrists
  • Addiction Counselors
  • Occupational Therapists
  • Case Managers
  • Nurses
  • Other Helping Professionals

Copyright : 09/28/2018

Safety as the Treatment: Reframing Trauma, Integrity, and Care in Contexts of Chronic Violence

This module challenges dominant biomedical models of trauma recovery by reframing care as the construction and maintenance of safety—material, relational, cultural, spiritual—rather than just symptom reduction. Drawing from neurobiology, cultural anthropology, and peacebuilding practice, Niconchuk explores how chronic instability, displacement, and structural violence reshape both the nervous system and the moral fabric of communities. It critiques the limits of individual, clinical approaches in the face of massive need, arguing for community-led, culturally resonant interventions that restore dignity, coherence, and relational safety. The module draws from the Salama organization’s Inner Safety framework which incorporates five domains of safety, as well drawing from polyvagal theory, the Generalized Unsafety Theory of Stress, and epistemic justice in trauma care. The lecture situates healing as both a political and relational act, rooted in historical traditions of care from bimaristans to Indigenous cosmologies. It interrogates questions of legitimacy, cultural authority, and evidence, highlighting tensions between RCT-driven models and lived, narrative-based healing practices. Ultimately, it invites practitioners to design for safety even when “post-trauma” conditions are not possible, and to view inner safety as a bridge toward broader social repair.

Program Information

Objectives

  1. Analyze the limitations of symptom-focused, biomedical models of trauma care in contexts of chronic instability, displacement, and structural violence.
  2. Apply the Salama Inner Safety Framework’s five domains to design interventions that cultivate felt safety across material, relational, cultural, spiritual, and somatic dimensions.
  3. Integrate principles of cultural listening and epistemic justice into trauma care, ensuring that local knowledge, moral narratives, and community-defined healing practices are central to intervention design.

Outline

Framing and Positioning

  • Central premise: In settings of chronic adversity, trauma care should be reframed as the creation of safety, not merely symptom reduction.
  • The limits of traditional biomedical models in contexts of chronic instability, displacement, and violence.
  • Historical perspectives on trauma care and how political, cultural, and moral dimensions have been overlooked.
  • Introduction of safety as multidimensional—material, relational, cultural/spiritual, somatic, and connected to place.
Module I — The Crisis of Scale and Scope
  • Global conflict and displacement statistics; scale of mental health need in war-affected populations; High prevalence of depression, anxiety, PTSD in conflict settings vs. limited resources and funding.
  • Infeasibility of individual, clinic-based care at scale in LMICs and humanitarian settings.
  • WHO advocacy for community care, self-care, and informal care models.
Module II — Safety as the Treatment
  • Challenges in contexts where safety is not a stable state but an ongoing negotiation.
  • Salama Inner Safety Framework — five domains
  • Polyvagal Theory, GUTS, and HRV as physiological underpinnings of felt safety.
  • Culturally specific cues of safety/danger and risks of universalizing these.
Module III — Recontextualizing Distress
  • Trauma in many cultures is experienced as moral, spiritual, and relational rupture—not only psychological injury.
  • Salāma in Arabic: wholeness, integrity, moral and physical safety.
  • Intergenerational impacts: colonial violence, displacement, authoritarianism fragment moral narratives and relational bonds; Healing as restoring coherence between self, community, and moral universe.
  • Epistemic justice: validating local knowledge, idioms, and interpretations of distress; Critique of RCT dominance and biomedical gatekeeping; limits in capturing relational, ritual, and narrative-based healing; Importance of cultural listening and honoring community definitions of “what works” and “what fits.”
Module IV — Designing for Safety, Not Just Recovery
  • Designing interventions around increasing access to safety resources across all domains.
  • Prioritizing culturally resonant, community-led models over imported protocols.
  • Examples from historical models (maristans, Indigenous healing cosmologies) that integrated dignity, beauty, and material stability into care.
  • Balancing rigor and accountability without assuming only modern clinical training can deliver safe, effective care.
Module V — Living With What Cannot Be Fixed
  • Acknowledging that in many contexts, full safety and resolution are impossible in the short term.
  • Healing as persistence, preservation, and reclaiming agency within ongoing harm.
  • Micro-acts of coherence: narrative control, relational boundaries, embodied practices.
  • Regulation as act of care; refusal to forget as a healing stance.
  • Inner safety as both a companion to and bridge toward outer safety and justice.

Copyright : 07/17/2025

Trauma Through the Lens of Polyvagal Theory

Polyvagal theory is helpful with understanding different physiological states people go through in relation to trauma. This is a positive perspective because it provides a roadmap of the damages of surviving trauma and the journey of recovery. With this knowledge, interventions are created that lead to healing and not to retriggering of old traumas.  

Program Information

Objectives

  1. Assess observable deficits in social engagement and communicate cues of safety via neuroception. 
  2. Apply three neural platforms that provide the neurophysiological bases for social engagement, fight/flight, and shutdown behaviors. 
  3. Integrate fight/flight and immobilization defense strategies education with individual and group therapy treatment into practice.

Outline

The Emergence of Polyvagal Informed Therapy: Harnessing Neuroception of Safety in Clinical Treatment

  • Polyvagal Theory 
  • Evolution as an Organizing Principle
  • Three Phylogenetic Stages of the Automatic Nervous System 
  • Hierarchical Model of Autonomic State 
  • The Quest for Safety 
  • Immobilization and Mobilization with Fear 
  • Social Engagement 
  • Neuroception 
    • Physiological State – Intervening Variable Capable of Biasing
Neuroception 
  • Vagal Break and Efficiency 
  • Covid-19 Pandemic 
  • Polyvagal Informed Therapies 
    • Implications and strategies for treatment

Target Audience

  • Counselors 
  • Social Workers 
  • Psychologists 
  • Psychotherapists 
  • Therapists 
  • Marriage and Family Therapists
  • Psychiatrists 
  • Addiction Counselors 
  • Occupational Therapists 
  • Case Managers 
  • Nurses 
  • Other Helping Professionals 

Copyright : 02/01/2021

Trauma Assessment of Children and Adults

This lecture will address some of the issues involved in assessing for trauma across the age span.  The use of objective measures will be discussed, including pros and cons.  Participants will learn how to formulate a case and how to use that formulation in clinical presentations.  In the assessment of children, participants will learn to be mindful of forensic complexities that often accompany child trauma evaluations. Careful attention will also be paid the assessment of dissociation.  Teaching methods will include didactic slides, case examples, and some experiential exercises.

Program Information

Objectives

  1. Participants will learn what information needs to be gathered, as well as how to gather that data when doing a trauma evaluation.
  2. Participants will learn how to formulate a case and practice presenting a case using that formulation.
  3. Participants will be able to identify the differences between a clinical evaluation and a forensic evaluation.

Outline

  • Overview of trauma assessments
    • What is a trauma evaluation?
    • Cultural considerations
  • Specifics of child trauma evaluation 
    • Objective Measure
    • Projective and structured measures
  • Specifics of adult trauma evaluation
    • Objective Measures
  • Dissociation
  • Psychological Testing
  • Formulation
    • How to present a case in 5 min
  • Considerations when doing a trauma evaluation
    • Clinical vs. forensic

Copyright : 01/17/2023

Childhood Trauma: Impact and Long-Term Consequences

Program Information

Target Audience

Addiction Counselors, Counselors, Marriage and Family Therapists, Nurses, Occupational Therapists, Occupational Therapy Assistants, Psychologists, Social Workers

Outline

  • Prevalence of trauma in clinical treatment settings
    • Iatrogenic consequences of current treatment approaches
  • Scope of childhood trauma – prevalence and type
    • Case demonstration and exercise – Still Face paradigm
    • Threat and fear messages from the limbic system
    • Patterns of developing distress tolerance
  • Childhood processing of trauma dependent on attachment environment
  • Normative responses to trauma – fight or flight, social connections
  • The role of the body in response to trauma
  • Varied approaches to trauma treatment, psychodrama, movement, synchronization           
  • Limbic responses to stress and threat
  • Protective social responses to trauma
  • Sensory nature of trauma experience
  • Differential responses from sexually traumatized children
  • Case demonstration – attunement and synchronicity
    • Balancing pleasurable experiences with trauma processing
  • History of DSM-IV development – DESNOS research
  • Complex trauma sequelae – disrupted affect, attention, self-image, impulse control
  • Developmental Trauma Disorder – definition and research findings
  • National Child Traumatic Stress Network – trauma and learning research
    • Effects of early trauma on emotional regulation, peer relations and psychopathology
    • Developmental timing of trauma experience
    • Benefits of public health intervention into early childhood and parenting
  • Psychobiological effects of sexual abuse – longitudinal research findings
  • Child trauma history – frequency and type
  • Developmental Trauma Disorder – criteria and research support
  • DSM-5 and politics

 

Objectives

  1. Evaluate the impact of trauma on behavior and processing of attachment experiences
  2. Characterize nonverbal interventions that reduce the severity of symptom experience and expression in traumatized children
  3. Critique and contrast current DSM-5 criteria for trauma disorders with current developmental trauma research findings

Copyright : 01/19/2023

The Scope of Trauma Treatment: From Acute Interventions to Restoration of Self-Experience

Program Information

Target Audience

Addiction Counselors, Counselors, Marriage and Family Therapists, Nurses, Occupational Therapists, Occupational Therapy Assistants, Psychologists, Social Workers

Objectives

  1. Evaluate current approaches to trauma treatment and select interventions that most effectively address specific symptom presentations
  2. Inspect treatment factors that can produce symptom exacerbation in post trauma clients
  3. Integrate findings from brain imaging research to inform clinical treatment interventions

Outline

  • Essential aspects of overcoming trauma
    • Action, community, self-regulation, processing traumatic memories
    • Centrality of social relationships to recovery – Yehuda research findings
      • Intergenerational transmission of PTSD
      • Influence of stress hormones, physical resonance with caregiver
  • Synchronicity – physical attunement with others
    • Methods of improving connection and experience of reciprocity
    • Case example – developing rhythmicity
  • Active response to threat – LeDoux research
    • Brain systems that generate active coping
    • Necessity and utility of movement in recovery process – treatment approaches
  • Affect regulation – self regulatory systems - purpose and motivations
    • Role of medications
    • Brain systems underlying affective response and regulation – polyvagal theory
    • Heart rate variability – useful interventions and relationship to mental/physical health
    • Mindfulness and yoga demonstration video
  • Accessing the emotional brain – knowing one’s self
    • Structural effects of meditation and physical approaches
    • Limitations of mindfulness interventions – MBSR research findings
  • Being able to tell the truth – uncovering secrets
    • John Bowlby and attachment research
    • Alexithymia and psychosomatic illness
  • Story telling and writing – advantages and potential negative aspects
  • Getting in touch with parts
    • Alterations in brain integration and stimuli response post trauma           
    • Importance of multimodal interventions
      • Neurofeedback case illustration
  • Selection of therapeutic interventions

 

Copyright : 01/12/2023

We Do Not Work Alone: Implementing and Sustaining Trauma-informed Systems

Our ability to provide excellent clinical healing is greatly influenced by the health of the systems within which we do our work. This course will examine what trauma-informed care is and the domains it impacts. Polyvagal theory provides us a tool with which to improve the experience of treaters and to support them in providing the most effective healing. The course will include practical strategies for promoting staff resilience and connection. We will also consider the impact of trauma-informed care (or its absence) in the larger systems in which we are imbedded, such as schools, medical settings, child welfare, government and other systems.

Program Information

Objectives

  1. Participants will identify the importance of trauma-informed systems for effective treatment interventions.
  2. Participants will be able to apply the basic assumptions of trauma-informed care.
  3. Using a basic understanding of polyvagal theory, participants will analyze how it applies to the work force and determine how it could be useful in their settings.
  4. Participants will construct three key strategies for implementation of trauma-informed care in a treatment program.
  5. Participants will develop awareness of a variety of multidisciplinary community examples for successful trauma-informed systems.

Outline

  • Implementing and sustaining trauma-informed systems
    • Rationale for systems based approaches
  • Agency level interventions
    • SAMHSA definition and principles for trauma-informed care
    • Domains of implementation
    • Parallel processes – agency level symptoms of stress
    • Basic characteristics and values of trauma-informed care
  • Developing a common language among multi-layered systems
    • Administrator responsibilities and influence
  • Elements of change process
  • Common concerns and worries
  • Using brain science to improve our organizations putting research into practice
    • Polyvagal theory
    • Applying polyvagal theory to our workplaces
  • Implications of brain science – 
    • Promoting staff relationships
    • Supervision
    • Teams that sustain treaters
    • Voice and choice
  • Supporting resilient treaters 
    • Developing resilience 
    • Attending to vicarious traumatization
  • Sustaining care
    • Addressing punitive influences
  • Measuring progress
  • Community level systems and impact of trauma
    • Trauma-informed schools
    • Medical settings
    • Measuring success at community level
  • Summary and Bibliography

Copyright : 12/06/2022

SMART: Sensory Motor Arousal Regulation Treatment

Join Elizabeth Warner and Alexandra Cook for an introduction to SMART: Sensory Motor and Arousal Regulation Treatment. Through both didactic material and film, you will understand how SMART was developed, how somatic regulation happens in a SMART room, what trauma processing looks like in the SMART model, and how you can build attachment with caregivers.

Program Information

Objectives

  1. Characterize and relate three forms of sensory motor input to the regulation of arousal in traumatized children and adolescents.
  2. Implement one co-regulating activity to enhance parent-child attunement and attachment building.
  3. Utilize childhood games in the SMART framework to address trauma processing in a fully embodied fashion.

Outline

  • The SMART spiral – weaving regulation, attachment and trauma processing
  • Co-occurring symptoms – multifaceted impact of interpersonal trauma and attachment disruption
    • Lack of response to somatic sensationsAttachment dysregulation and family disruption
    • Attention and consciousness dysregulation
    • Cognitive distortions – executive function
    • Negative alterations to self-image
  • Aims of SMART treatment – increasing tolerance and adaptability, creating an integrated sense of self
  • Components of Complex Trauma treatment
    • Safety, skill building, attachment, trauma processing, positive sense of self
  • Neurology related to trauma – Connectome Project
    • Role of play in creating healing environment
    • Neuroscience underlying SMART approach to treatment 
    • Negative effects of complex trauma on brain structures
    • Positive effects of environmental enrichment – implications for therapy spaces
  • Advantages of SMART approach to trauma treatment – bottom-up approach
    • The roots of development – developmental hierarchy
  • Structural underpinnings to arousal regulation – varied modes of regulation
    • Application to therapy setting and interventions
  • Understanding states – discrete and discontinuous nature
    • Working in the fluid zone
  • Somatic regulation and multisensory integration
    • Ayres sensory integration principles – development is sequential and rational
    • Importance of sensation in early development
    • Tools of somatic regulation – modulating arousal level and reactivity
    • Tactile systems – calming and arousing
    • Therapeutic use of touch – trauma related considerations
    • Practice exercise – proprioception
    • Vestibular system – bilateral coordination and spatial relationships    
      • Practice exercise – vestibular input
  • Sensory satiation through varying intensity, duration and frequency
  • Combining inputs – multisensory integration
  • Use of rhythmic exercises to promote connection and attunement
    • Practice exercise – experience and memories
  • Use of safe spaces to facilitate regulation and trauma processing
    • Video case demonstration – sensory input seeking
  • Sensory input worksheet
  • Collaboration with occupational therapy resources
  • Therapist skills – internal and external
  • Integrating caregivers effectively into the SMART framework
  • SMART outcome research in residential treatment settings
    • Developing in-home and outpatient applications

Target Audience

  • Counselors
  • Social Workers
  • Psychologists
  • Psychotherapists
  • Therapists
  • Marriage and Family Therapists
  • Psychiatrists
  • Addiction Counselors
  • Occupational Therapists
  • Case Managers
  • Nurses
  • Other Helping Professionals

Copyright : 02/26/2021

Sensorimotor Psychotherapy: Theory and Practice

Dr. Pat Ogden, the founder of Sensorimotor Therapy, will take us through the process of helping clients heal by using somatic resources in place of talk therapy.  She will explain how therapists can use the wisdom of the body to tune in to their client’s history of trauma, attachment failures, and oppression.  By detailing the movements, principles, and application of Sensorimotor Therapy, Dr. Ogden adds valuable skills to the therapist toolbox.

Program Information

Objectives

  1. Distinguish how Sensorimotor therapy can inform the clinician’s choice of treatment interventions.
  2. Catalogue the five fundamental movements of Sensorimotor therapy that can instill hope in clients and can stretch the boundaries of their Window of Tolerance.
  3. Catalogue the principles that create the context needed to maximize growth and healing in Sensorimotor Therapy.
  4. Demonstrate how a client’s somatic narrative can influence his/her Window of Tolerance.

Outline

  • Sensorimotor Psychotherapy
    • The wisdom of the body
    • The somatic narrative
    • The dysregulated defenses of the body and the Window of Tolerance
  • Trauma and Stress
    • The influences of our trauma and stress
    • Intersectionality
    • Neuroception by Stephen Porges
  • Prioritizing Regulation
    • Triggers
    • Resources
    • Repetition
  • Embedded Relational Mindfulness
    • Definition
    • Five building blocks
    • Tracking and experimenting
    • Resourcing vs.Processing
  • The Modulation Model
    • SNS Hyperarousal Zone
    • Social Engagement
    • DVC Hypoarousal Zone
  • Attachment System
    • Attachment Theory
    • Habitual ways of reaching out
    • Unresolved relational adversity
    • Legacy of Implicit and Explicit Bias
  • The five fundamental movements of Sensorimotor Therapy
    • Yield
    • Push
    • Reach
    • Grasp
    • Pull
  • Philosophical-Spiritual Principles
    • Organicity
    • Non-violence
    • Unity
    • Mind-Body-Spirit Holism
    • Relational Alchemy
    • Presence and Mindfulness

Target Audience

  • Counselors
  • Social Workers
  • Psychologists
  • Psychotherapists
  • Therapists
  • Marriage and Family Therapists
  • Psychiatrists
  • Addiction Counselors
  • Occupational Therapists
  • Case Managers
  • Nurses
  • Other Helping Professionals

Copyright : 02/12/2021

Trauma, PTSD, and the Mind-Body Relationship

Program Information

Outline

  • Trauma impacts the connection between the mind and body
    • Techniques for grounding, expansion, giving/receiving sensations
    • Yoga practices – universality of mind-body practices
  • Transforming trauma, loss and disability – living fully in the body
    • Impairing effects of trauma
    • Quality of presence in the body
    • Value of compensation systems
  • Understanding the landscape of trauma
    • Types of trauma – applying varied approaches to varied trauma
    • Dimensions of trauma impact on individuals – disruption of time and memory
  • Therapy goals toward returning the mind to a comfortable relationship with the body
    • Case example – post traumatic flashback
    • Combining body approaches with psychotherapy
  • Disruptions to time sense – understanding the ways in which memory invades the present and future
    • Identifying with client experience
  • Frequent symptoms of trauma and PTSD
    • Effects on mind-body relationship – disconnections, functional losses, sense of personal space
  • Core mind-body sensations
    • Case example – sensory disruptions
    • Inward dimensions of mind-body relationship – engaging intangible experience
  • Dissociation and coping with trauma
    • Case example – silence and struggle for words
  • Partner work exercises:  Yoga and creating mind-body awareness
  • Facilitating a sense of safety and calm – finding home again
  • Reciprocal support – restoring trust
  • Balance – shifting awareness
  • Taking up space – restoring sense of safety
  • Block and sandbag work – passive and active grounding
  • Foot and arch poses – sense of lift and lightness
  • Sacral exercise – filling the vessel
  • Standing poses - partner support and making effortful effort effortless
  • Floor poses – trust, vulnerability and support
  • Passive chest opening – spreading awareness through the limbs
  • Quieting practices – bringing calm into a challenging world
    • Cautionary guidelines for work with traumatized individuals
  • Back to back exercise – rhythm and calming, support without judgement
  • Sitting exercise – relieving suffering and effort
  • Restoring resilient and flexible boundaries
  • Solo exercises – muscular action as reference to restore mind-body relationship
    • Brain activation – calming the cortex
  • Common elements of varied mind-body practices
    • Reclaiming interior spaces – grounding and living with trauma memories
    • Partner exercise – accepting support and allowing vulnerability
  • Recovery process from powerlessness and traumatic separation of mind and body relationship

Objectives

  1. Develop an intuitive understanding of the effect that trauma has on the mind-body relationship
  2. Practice exercises to facilitate reconnecting the mind and body for trauma survivors
  3. Characterize three ways in which trauma memories manifest in the body and actions of clients. 
  4. Individualize movement and yoga exercises for specific expressions of trauma symptoms in post trauma individuals
  5. Modify body-based interventions for individuals who have sensitivities associated with traumatic experiences

Target Audience

Counselors - Social Workers - Psychologists - Psychotherapists - Therapists - Marriage and Family Therapists - Psychiatrists - Addiction Counselors - Occupational Therapists - Case Managers – Nurses - Other Helping Professionals

Copyright : 12/15/2022

Embodied Awareness

Awareness of our bodily sensations is important for understanding self-regulation, co-regulation, and healing from trauma. Our senses: sight, sound, touch, smell, taste, balance, and orientation inform our nervous system of our state of safety or danger, agitation or calm, and our capacity to focus and respond to what is around us. Our nervous system has a reciprocal relationship with our breathing, heart rate, muscular tension, and autonomic bodily functions. When exposed to danger, our nervous system responds faster than the speed of thought—our heart rates speed up, our breathing becomes shallow, our muscles become tighter, and our focus hones in on the threat at hand. Our rational thinking takes a back seat to the urgency of restoring safety, and our availability to focus and think in response to our environment is limited until safety is restored.

Trauma keeps us in a heightened perception of danger and harm and prevents us from updating our reality. Our incomplete or thwarted physical attempts to re-establish physical and emotional protection become parts that hold patterns of vigilance, which then compromise our capacity to respond effectively to our environments, relationships, and ourselves. 

Restoring that ability and capacity requires re-establishing awareness of our senses and, through them, an awareness of our nervous system and being able to befriend our interior reactions to our surroundings.
 

Program Information

Objectives

  1. Practice body-centered approaches drawn from theater, music, yoga, and play for building attunement, restoring agency, and dealing with trauma.
  2. Appraise how non-verbal awareness affects physical and emotional states.
  3. Role-play techniques to explore non-verbal awareness in movement.

Outline

In this module, we will learn, through guided focused exercises in the present moment, to notice subtle inner shifts, and pay attention to our senses, including the ways we habitually ignore our physical reactions. We will explore and activate the innate self-regulatory capacities that we all carry within us to more fully engage with our bodies, thoughts, feelings, and selves. 

Copyright : 01/16/2023

Use of Play and Activity to Support Trauma-informed Treatment

Program Information

Objectives

  1. Demonstrate how play can be used to support trauma therapy in children to improve functioning, mental health, and coping.
  2. Analyze the four domains of structure and demonstrate via case examples and video how implementation of the domains provides the foundation upon which healing can occur.
  3. Evaluate the use of play and the efficacy of the 4 Domains of Structure across various cultures and in response to various types of trauma exposure.

Outline

Introduction to Steve Gross

Chief Playmaker at the Life is Good Kid’s Foundation

 

Massachusetts Reception

  • Treating People Humanely
    • Helping Orient People to a New Location
    • Creating a Space of Normalcy
    • Establishing Structure
    • Engaging Teens
  • Schedule Routine
    • Getting Kids into School
    • Specific Meal Times/Snack Times
    • Quiet Times
  • Importance of Sleep
    • Educating Parents
    • Sleep Hygiene
    • Room Darkening
    • Storybooks
    • Soft Music

 

Four Domains of Structure

Internal Control

Active Engagement

Social Connection

Creating/Evoking Joyfulness

 

Mississippi: Post Katrina

Work with Pre-School Teachers to Provide Structure

Asking the Kids to Teach Adults How to Play

Joining with Kids in Play

Video Example: Parachute & Drum

  • Exposure to Sensations in a Fun & Safe Way
  • Containment Through the Rhythm & Calmness of Your Presence
  • Metaphor of the Storm

Body Energy

Soothing Exercise: “Hot Hands”

 

Sumatra, Indonesia: Post Tsunami

Trauma Training for Providers

Video Clip

  • Bodyguard Game with Muslim Girls
  • Connection, Purpose, Concentration, Fun

 

Haiti: Post Earthquake

Feeling “Over-Your-Head”

Being a “Helper” vs. “Rescuer” or “Savior”

Learning from the Culture

  • Utilizing the Resources of the Local People
  • Teaching the Care Providers
  • Empowering the Care Providers to Lead & Train

Biggest Challenge: Building Relationships & Trust

Video Examples

 

Japan

Different Culture; Same Effectiveness

Great Honor of All People 

Target Audience

Counselors - Social Workers - Psychologists - Psychotherapists - Therapists - Marriage and Family Therapists - Psychiatrists - Addiction Counselors - Occupational Therapists - Case Managers – Nurses - Other Helping Professionals

Copyright : 02/14/2019

Trauma Processing with Children

Program Information

Outline

  • Impact of adverse childhood experiences on developmental stages
    • Factors that predict prognosis
  • Our role as trauma therapists
    • Areas that require specialized intervention
    • Addressing influence of trauma on specific abilities
    • Common presentation of post trauma symptoms
  • When to use EMDR with children – integration with adjunctive therapies
    • Awareness of shifting perspectives for children, vulnerability to small changes in presentation
    • EMDR process in children
    • Channels of associations
  • Resource work with EMDR – developing positive skills
  • Evaluating perspective in affected children – developing competence
  • Benefits of EMDR – management of memories and affect
  • EMDR protocol – elements and steps
    • Utilization outside of standard protocol
    • How EMDR affects PTSD
  • Integrating EMDR into the treatment of attachment disorder
  • Mood, affect regulation and attachment interventions
    • Incorporating affect tolerance, developmental and cognitive levels into approach
    • Incorporating caretakers into therapy
    • Utilizing subjective assessment and information
  • Evaluating the therapeutic benefit of play
  • Formulating the therapeutic intervention – structure and sequence
    • Video case example – coping with failure

 

Objectives

  1. Apply EMDR, play therapy and attachment interventions to effectively treat to varied child trauma presentations.
  2. Adapt standard EMDR protocols to address the specialized needs of traumatized child clients.
  3. Analyze and respond to common disruptions to the trauma therapy intervention.

Target Audience

Counselors - Social Workers - Psychologists - Psychotherapists - Therapists - Marriage and Family Therapists - Psychiatrists - Addiction Counselors - Occupational Therapists - Case Managers – Nurses - Other Helping Professionals

Copyright : 10/10/2018

Making Connections: The Neuropsychology of Sandplay Therapy in the Treatment of Trauma

This course provides an overview of the neuropsychology of trauma and sandplay therapy. Students will explore the impact of trauma on the brain, body, and psyche/soul and discover how sandplay heals trauma from a neuropsychological perspective.  Leading theories on trauma treatment are reviewed and applied to case studies in sandplay with an emphasis on theories rooted in neurodevelopment, depth psychology, affective neuroscience and body-centered therapies.

Program Information

Objectives

  1. Define trauma and its effects on the brain, body, psyche/soul.
  2. Identify the key tenets and “three roots” of sandplay therapy (SPT).
  3. Describe four essential components of SPT that promote neural integration and healing of trauma.
  4. Apply concepts to case studies in sandplay therapy.

Outline

  • Overview of how trauma affects the brain and body
  • Creation of sandplay therapy
    • Research support
    • Trauma examples
    • Origins
  • Exploration of three roots of sandplay therapy
    • Lowenfeld’s world technique- play therapy
    • Jung’s depth psychology
    • Tibetan Buddhism with Eastern contemplative practices
  • Identification of seven key tenets of sandplay:
    • There is an innate tendency for the psyche to develop and heal itself
    • The psyche consists of both conscious and unconscious dimensions
    • Imagery, symbols, creative expression and self-directed play are primary means by which psyche expresses itself
    • In a free and protected space, the psyche follows an inherent pattern of development and naturally moves toward growth
    • As the psyche expresses itself, the sandplay therapist serves as a silent witness, attuned to its unfolding
    • Encounters with one’s sacred and directing center lie at the core of the change process in sandplay
    • Journey inward to discover wholeness leads toward embodied relatedness toward the outside world
  • Comparison sandplay vs sand tray therapy
  • Explanation of neuropsychology of sandplay therapy 
    • Neural integration and nine domains
    • Brain growth and development
    • Neuro-sensory feedback loop
    • Three stages of self
    • Patient’s experience using sandplay therapy
  • Review of neurosequential model of therapeutics
    • Connection of brain structures and intervention
  • Defining four components of sandplay therapy that promote neural integration
    • Relational safety and generous attunement
    • Somatosensory engagement
    • Symbolic expression of trauma narrative
    • Mindful participation 
  • Case example: sandplay, trauma, and neural integration

Target Audience

  • Counselors
  • Social Workers 
  • Psychologists
  • Psychotherapists
  • Therapists
  • Marriage and Family Therapists
  • Psychiatrists
  • Addiction Counselors
  • Occupational Therapists
  • Case Managers
  • Nurses
  • Other Helping Professionals 

Copyright : 12/29/2022

The Importance of Play in the Treatment of Trauma

Attachment trauma interferes with many aspects of a person’s functioning, one of which is the capacity for joy and connection through play or playful interactions. Many clients who experience abuse and next have trauma embedded in their play history.  Imagine, for example, that a child plays too loudly or exuberantly and is then yelled at, shamed or hit as punished.  If play is chronically overshadowed by this type of interpersonal trauma, a small act of silliness or playfulness may feel dangerous. However, play behavior is crucial for the positive aspects of living a fulfilling life: being able to joke, laugh, dance, smile with others, and feeling exuberance, amusement, a sense of lightness and energy, is not only the result of healing a traumatic past, it is also a vehicle for resolving interpersonal trauma.  Harnessing the life-energy of play in psychotherapy, whether with children, adults or couples, can help clients overcome aspects of their traumatic past and re-capture their sense of “aliveness” and connection.  This workshop will provide tools and strategies to purposefully and mindfully use play techniques focused on the basic play principles: the social engagement system (voice, movement, touch, gestures, facial expressions, eye contact) to produce surprise, laughter, synchrony and joy.  The workshop will also emphasize the importance of co-regulation, attunement and repair between therapist.

Program Information

Objectives

  1. Assess when play techniques should be used in the treatment of attachment trauma.
  2. Describe 3 play techniques for increasing energy and connection between therapist and client.
  3. Identify 3 play techniques for practicing self-regulation.

Outline

  • The role of play in attachment and development of self-regulation
  • Psychic effects of being traumatized during play
  • Helping clients identifying their play history
  • Using play techniques for enhancing connection, aliveness, energy
  • Using play techniques for practicing self-regulation
  • Harnessing natural moments of rupture and repair in play to develop resilience
  • Gauging intensity, quality, and types of play for different client presentations

Copyright : 01/04/2023

Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) Therapy: A Model for Accelerated Change

Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) is a memory-focused, evidence-based psychotherapy that highlights the role of the brain’s information processing system in the development and treatment of a wide range of mental health problems. EMDR therapists are guided by the Adaptive Information Processing (AIP) model, which proposes that psychopathology results from a failure to adequately process traumatic or other adverse life experiences to a point of “adaptive resolution.” Various forms of bilateral stimulation (tracking fingers or a light moving back and forth for visual stimulation, listening to binaural tones, or receiving alternating taps on the hands) are used to activate and support critical components of the brain’s information processing system.

In this course, Dr. Korn will introduce participants to the AIP model, describe EMDR’s evolution over time, and provide an overview of current EMDR research and clinical applications. She will also discuss the role of eye movements and other forms of bilateral stimulation in facilitating change and healing at multiple levels. EMDR therapy attends to the past experiences that set the groundwork for pathology, the current situations that trigger maladaptive trauma-based responses, and future goals for handling challenges and overall mental health. The eight phases of EMDR treatment will be explained in detail and video clips will be used to bring this effective and efficient psychotherapy to life.

Program Information

Objectives

  1. Describe EMDR therapy, review its empirical base of support in the treatment of PTSD and other psychiatric conditions, and introduce the Adaptive Information Processing (AIP) model used to guide treatment.
  2. Explain the role of eye movements and some of the leading hypotheses about mechanisms of action in EMDR therapy.
  3. Discuss several case studies and review the eight phases of EMDR therapy as well as the three-pronged protocol for addressing 1) past traumatic experiences, 2) current triggers and symptoms, and 3) goals for future adaptive behavior.

Outline

  • Introduction
    • EMDR as a Comprehensive Psychotherapy 
    • EMDR’s Development and Evolution over the Decades
    • EMDR Research and Efficacy
    • EMDR Therapy Applications - Disorders, Settings, Populations
    • Duration of Treatment
  • EMDR’s Adaptive Information Processing  (AIP) Model
    • Memories ”Frozen” in the Nervous System
    • How the AIP Model Guides Case Conceptualization and Treatment Planning
    • The Role of Eye Movements in EMDR
    • Hypotheses about Mechanisms of Action
  • EMDR Treatment
    • Eight Phases of EMDR Treatment
    • How EMDR Works: Procedural Steps and Moment-to-Moment Decision-making
    • Video Case Study 1
    • Video Case Study 2
  • Responding to Processing Blocks and Various Challenges in Treatment
    • Use of Cognitive Interweaves
    • Expected Treatment Outcomes
    • Video Case Study 3
  • EMDR Training and Opportunities for Further Learning

Copyright : 12/19/2022

The DE-CRUIT Monologue Method: Treating Trauma Through Narrative Embodiment

DE-CRUIT program uses theatre—and specifically Shakespeare—to address traumatic stress and associated problems encountered by veterans as they navigate the transition from military life to civilian life. The treatment program was originally designed specifically to address the range of military, pre-military and post-military traumas that veterans need to work through in order to move forward with their lives. However, working with family members of veterans, incarcerated populations, addicted populations in recovery and university students has shown the DE-CRUIT treatment method provides a controlled mechanism for civilians to access and examine charged memories as well.

Therapists understand the profound healing that can occur when we “speak what we feel, not what we ought to say,” as Shakespeare writes in King Lear. But how can Shakespeare help us do this? Experience how classical actor training methods using body, breath, play, and awareness can help treat trauma across a range of populations. Drawing on psychological, social, and neurological science, the DE-CRUIT method encourages trauma survivors to use Shakespeare’s characters and spoken verse to awaken self-awareness, discover a new physical presence, observe inner thoughts and behaviors without judgment, and exchange limiting habits for new positive patterns of growth and reflection.

Program Information

Objectives

  1. Practice the application of stage skills in shifting traumatic responses to put to practical use in-session for symptom management.
  2. Demonstrate how to use Shakespeare’s dramatic verse to help trauma survivors provide language to articulate their traumatic events.
  3. Investigate techniques from classical actor training that assist in mitigating the effects of dysregulation and increasing self-efficacy.

Outline

  • Establish Community (10 min)
  • Establish Routine of Recovery (10 min)
  • Establish Breath & Rhythm (10 min)
    • Add Language
  • Establish A Container to Play (20 min)
  • Break (10 min)
  • Prompted Writings (10 min)
  • Monologue Algorithm (15 min)
  • Using Shakespeare As A Tool (45 min)
  • Break (10 min)
  • Communalization of Our Experiences (30 min)
  • Reinforcement (10 min)

Copyright : 11/21/2022

Working with Problematic Sexual Behavior in Children & Youth by John Ebert & Tarah Kuhn

Program Information

Objectives

  1. Analyze child and adolescent sexual behavior and important developmental milestones, and demonstrate how sexual development changes across the lifespan.
  2. Differentiate normal developmental sexual behaviors from problematic sexual behaviors.
  3. Determine the appropriate and most effective responses to problematic sexual behavior, including identifying the 3 Effective Response Goals, when to report abuse, and how to create safety and support plans.

Outline

Sexual Development & Normal Sexual Behaviors

Sexual Development Across the Lifespan

Sexual Developmental Milestones

 

Sexual Behaviors

Normal Sexual Behaviors

  • Infant/Toddler
  • Ages 3-5
  • Elementary Age
  • Adolescents

Sexual Behavior Problems

  • Origins of Sexual Behavior Problems
  • Associations with Maltreatment

Treatment for Sexual Behavior Problems

 

Understanding Teenagers

The Teenage Brain

Typical Teen Behaviors

Media Influences

LGTBQ Youth

Adolescents with Illegal Sexual Behavior (AISB)

  • AISB vs. Adult Sex Offenders
  • AISB & Trauma
  • Implications for Treatment

 

Examples of Sexual Behavior Problems

Normal Sexual Behavior

Reactive Sexual Behavior

Sexualized

Coercive Sexual Behavior

 

Effective Response to Sexual Behavior Problems

Levels of Response

When to Report

Safety & Support Plans

Target Audience

Addiction Counselors, Counselors, Marriage and Family Therapists, Nurses, Occupational Therapists, Occupational Therapy Assistants, Psychologists, Social Workers

Copyright : 02/22/2019

Trauma & Altered States of Consciousness

Program Information

Objectives

  1. Articulate the effects of trauma on psychopathology
  2. Apply therapeutic trauma interventions to the four consciousness dimensions of symptom presentation
  3. Propose alterations in dimensions of consciousness that differentiate between dissociative and non-dissociative trauma psychopathology.

Outline

  • PTSD- diagnostic criteria and core symptomology
    • Dissociative and preschool subtypes
  • Psychiatric comorbidity of chronic early trauma
    • Attachment and formation of a secure base
    • Substance use and self-medication as response to trauma symptoms
    • Dissociation as response to dysregulated emotional states
  • Developing adequate emotion regulation capacities – importance of caregiver-infant bond
    • The attachment relationship – optimal zone of arousal
  • Dissociation as an altered state of consciousness in response to overwhelming experience
  • Four dimensions of consciousness affected by trauma
    • 4-D model of altered states in traumatized individuals
    • Dissociative and non-dissociative presentations in each dimension
    • Adaptive vs maladaptive function of symptoms
  • Consciousness of time – temporality
    • Episodic memory and disruption of flow
    • Remembering vs reliving
  • Affect regulation and the origin of the self
  • Brain structures affected by trauma – neuroimaging studies
    • The nature of traumatic memory and clinical implications
  • Present vs past centered therapies – outcome research and future directions
  • Consciousness of thought – tendency to sad, shameful and angry narratives
    • Dissociative change in narrative perspective – creating a shared narrative
  • Voice hearing and dissociation – association with trauma-related disorders
    • Working with perpetrator introjects
  • Moving toward self-compassion – increasing the capacity for empathy
  • Consciousness of and in the body – embodiment
    • Healing boundaries disrupted by trauma
    • Neurobiology of embodied consciousness
    • Body scan approach – case example of EEG neurofeedback training
  • Consciousness of emotion – affect
    • Associated brain structures – Periaqueductal Gray
    • Panksepp’s basic emotional systems
    • Implications for therapy – emotion dysregulation, addressing shame
    • Bottom up and top down regulation approaches
  • Comprehensive resource model and limitations of research
  • Dissociative dimensions of emotion – compartmentalization
    • Defense cascade model – fight, flight, freeze responses
    • Clinical implications of affective awakening – titration of positive emotions
  • Building attachment resources
  • Healing the traumatized self:  The rebirth of the self
    • 4D model and sense of self – from trauma to recovery

 

Target Audience

Counselors - Social Workers - Psychologists - Psychotherapists - Therapists - Marriage and Family Therapists - Psychiatrists - Addiction Counselors - Occupational Therapists - Case Managers – Nurses - Other Helping Professionals

Copyright : 01/16/2019

Internal Family Systems

Program Information

Objectives

  • Utilize IFS conceptualizations to develop and implement interventions that reduce post trauma symptoms
  • Analyze the relationship between varied personality parts and facilitate effective integration of disconnected aspects of personality
  • Structure and sequence IFS interventions in response to specific client presentations and therapeutic engagement

Outline

  • Development of Internal Family Systems Therapy and evolution into trauma approaches
    • Historical development of family systems therapies
      • Results of early family systems interventions
      • Relationship of personality parts and cycle of self-talk – impact on symptom expression
  • Integration of family systems into standard psychoanalytic interventions
    • Limitations of standard intervention practices
    • Respecting and acknowledgement of protective parts of individuals
  • Conceptualization of individual clients as systems of parts, each with positive and negative aspects
    • Accepting the role of negative parts, offering respect and acceptance
    • Nature of mind to operate as nonunitary system of parts
    • Alteration of structure and communication in post trauma individuals
      • Polarization and iatrogenic effects of current interventions
      • Applying family systems approaches within individuals
  • Characteristics of a healthily functioning Self – the eight c’s of Self leadership
    • The five characteristics of a healthily functioning IFS therapist
  • Differences between attachment theory and Internal Family Systems conceptualizations
    • Results and implications of MDMA trauma treatment research
  • Avoiding negative responses to IFS interventions
    • Power and desperation of protective systems and parts – ongoing burdens
  • Respecting the system – joining with protectors, obtaining permission
    • Ongoing influence of traumatized self-parts - internal exiles, managers, fire fighters
      • Prioritizing interventions with varied parts – protectors before exiles
      • User friendly choice of therapeutic language
      • Negotiating with parts to allow access without overwhelming the client
  • Aspects of successful resolution
  • Case example of IFS interventions – relationship disruption, transference and rage
    • Witnessing, retrieval, unburdening protectors

 

Target Audience

Counselors - Social Workers - Psychologists - Psychotherapists - Therapists - Marriage and Family Therapists - Psychiatrists - Addiction Counselors - Occupational Therapists - Case Managers – Nurses - Other Helping Professionals

Copyright : 09/05/2018

The Use of Internal Family Systems Model in Trauma Treatment

Most modes of psychotherapy believe to have “parts” is pathological. NOT in Internal Family Systems (IFS). In IFS, the idea of multiplicity of the mind is normal. Every part has a good intention, and every part has value. Even for trauma survivors. In the treatment of trauma, IFS differs from traditional phase-oriented treatments. Instead of starting with building resources in clients before processing traumatic memories,it welcomes extreme symptoms from the onset, learns about their positive protective intentions and gets their permission to access the traumatic wounds. IFS is the treatment method that all clinicians should know. Nearly all clients with a trauma history have innate abilities that help them improve their mental health if they listen to their parts. IFS does just that. IFS is an evidence-based approach for clinicians working with traumatized clients. Once you see it in action, you’ll want to incorporate it into your practice.

Program Information

Objectives

  1. Present the IFS Model and design ways to integrate IFS into your clinical practice. 
  2. Specify and work with your client’s parts as defined by developer Richard Schwartz, PhD. 
  3. Model how to work with clinician’s own parts. 
  4. Critique an alternate view of symptoms and psychopathology, reasoning that these are ways your clients are trying to protect themselves from emotional pain and psychological wounding. 
  5. Communicate how IFS increases the therapist’s curious and compassionate self when working with difficult and challenging clients. 
  6. Evaluate the neuroscience behind the healing process in IFS therapy.

Outline

  • Treating the Various Types of Trauma 
  • Internal Family Systems (IFS): Permanent Healing of Emotional Wounds 
  • Managing Common Co-Morbidities 
  • Differentiating Therapeutic Issues from Biological Conditions 
  • The IFS Technique
    • Step 1: Identifying the Target Symptom 
    • Step 2: Gain Access to Internal Strengths & Resources for Healing 
    • Step 3: Finding the Fear and Function of the Symptom 
  • Attachment Disorders and Relational Trauma 
  • Dealing with the Extreme Reactions of Trauma 
  • How Neuroscience Informs Therapeutic Decisions 
  • Step 4: Permanent Healing of Traumatic Wounds 
  • Integrate IFS into Your Treatment Approach

Copyright : 01/05/2023

Implementing a Trauma-Informed Approach in Community, Hospital and Low-Income Settings

Research shows that histories of trauma are consistently associated with self-harming behavior, suicidality, eating disorders, and substance abuse. But especially in hospital and community settings, these clients are labeled ‘borderline’ or as ‘addicts,’ and the effects of the trauma are rarely addressed.

Trauma-Informed Stabilization Treatment (TIST) was specifically developed for a community hospital setting to provide a trauma-informed approach to the challenge of self-destructive symptoms and chronic institutionalization. TIST is a treatment modality that integrates mindfulness-based techniques with ideas and interventions drawn from Sensorimotor Psychotherapy, Internal Family Systems, and hypnotic ego state work. Because it contextualizes self-destructive behavior as trauma-related, driven by parts fighting or fleeing a world they perceive as dangerous, TIST clients feel validated rather than pathologized, increasing their determination to create safety for their wounded parts.

Program Information

Objectives

  1. Identify animal defense survival responses as manifested in the symptoms of traumatized clients.
  2. Apply the language of parts to describe internal conflicts and self-destructive impulses.
  3. Implement 3 interventions for increasing client acceptance and management of their trauma-related parts.

Outline

  • The development of TIST as a trauma-informed intervention for chronically institutionalized and low-income clients
  • Working with self-destructive behavior a manifestation of trauma-related parts 
  • Developing a safe internal environment for all parts of the client

Copyright : 06/07/2023

Neurofeedback Training as an Alternative Non-pharmaceutical Treatment Modality for Development Trauma

Developmental trauma is arguably one of the costliest public health challenges in the USA and defined as a chronic early childhood exposure to neglect and abuse by their caregiver. Developmental trauma has been shown to have a long-lasting adverse pervasive impact on mental, physical functioning as well as neurophysiological development. This impact includes shorter lifespans, interference with adequate daily functioning, and compromises the ability for an individual to benefit from other treatments. Neurofeedback is one promising treatment modality for developmental trauma.

Neurofeedback is a non-pharmaceutical, self-regulation treatment modality that alters electrical brain activities associated with various brain conditions including PTSD and developmental trauma. Research has shown that for children and adults with developmental trauma, neurofeedback significantly reduces PTSD symptoms and improves behavioral, cognitive, emotional, and executive functioning.

This presentation focuses on neurofeedback as a treatment modality for developmental trauma. It begins with a theoretical background of neurofeedback including discussing relevant research and how neurofeedback can address neurophysiological disturbances. The majority of the presentation is dedicated to implementation and ways of incorporating neurofeedback into the clinic setting. The presentation concludes with a discussion of the challenges related to neurofeedback and future directions of neurofeedback. Throughout there will be case presentations, research data and a demonstration of a neurofeedback session.

Program Information

Objectives

  1. Define neurofeedback, how it works, and how it can help individuals with developmental trauma.
  2. Evaluate the efficacy of neurofeedback as a treatment modality for individuals with developmental trauma.
  3. Describe the ways and benefits of incorporating neurofeedback and into a clinical practice.

Outline

  • Motivation
  • Defining neurofeedback, its underlying principles, and research related to neurofeedback as a treatment modality to treat individuals with developmental trauma 
  • Ways to incorporate neurofeedback into the clinical practice
  • Challenges and future directions of neurofeedback

 

Target Audience

Counselors - Social Workers - Psychologists - Psychotherapists - Therapists - Marriage and Family Therapists - Psychiatrists - Addiction Counselors - Occupational Therapists - Case Managers – Nurses - Other Helping Professionals

Copyright : 01/13/2023

The Future of Trauma Interventions

Program Information

Objectives

  1. Reviews the history of trauma in the creation of the PTSD diagnosis; highlights how the memory-focused treatment of trauma fails to take into account the processing of trauma in the present and the present impact of how one organizes what is seen, how one organizes their actions, how one organizes interactions with others, and one’s present experience of trauma.
  2. Explains how chronic stress changes the brain and identifies the impact of stress and trauma on specific brain structures.
  3. Identifies non-traditional, non-memory focused treatment options that have been shown to be effective for treating trauma, including: yoga, music, exercise, theater, mindfulness, and MDMA.

Outline

  • Politics & Trauma
    • Veterans & Trauma
    • Trauma & Processing Information
    • Stuck in a Memory-Focused View of Trauma Treatment
    • ACES / Scope of Childhood Trauma
    • Trauma: Largest Health Problem in United States
  • Trauma Changes the Brain
    • Cytokines & Inflammation
    • Types of Trauma People Experience
    • Complex Post-Traumatic Stress Sequelae
    • NCTSN Study
    • DSM-5 Random Trauma Related Diagnoses
    • Quality of Parental Care & Attachment
  • The Future of Trauma Care
    • The Four “R’s”
    • Self-Regulation Video Example
    • Examples of Non-Traditional Effective Trauma Therapy
    • Case Example: Noah & 9-11
    • Learning from Attachment
    • Thinking-Brain Dominant Strategies
    • Polyvagal Theory
    • Brain Changes as a Result of Trauma
    • Synchrony, Attunement, & Skill Building
  • Overcoming Trauma
    • Re-establish Community
    • Taking Effective Action
    • Establishing Emotional Regulation
    • Accessing the Emotional Brain
    • Tell the Truth
    • Figuring Out the Best Interventions to Repair Damage
    • Example: MDMA for Trauma Treatment

Target Audience

Counselors - Social Workers - Psychologists - Psychotherapists - Therapists - Marriage and Family Therapists - Psychiatrists - Addiction Counselors - Occupational Therapists - Case Managers – Nurses - Other Helping Professionals

Copyright : 07/20/2023

Psychedelics for Trauma Treatment

Copyright : 11/05/2024